Mindy halfway accuses Creepy Pete of plagiarism in today’s strip, something I actually enjoyed in concept. I would probably have enjoyed it in execution too if it was not wrapped in a dreadful gag about it being surprising that a woman would know comic book minutiae.

The gag, such as it is, falls apart if you assume that Pete has chatted about Mindy with her ex-boyfriend, his good high school buddy Eric “Mooch” Myers, who knows full well that there was a time not too long ago when she was not at all interested in comic books.

Of course, why would anyone assume that? Who even remembers that Mindy dated Mooch back in high school or that she and Pete met at least once during that time? Not the author of this strip, I can tell you that.

Have a safe and happy July 4th, SOSFers! Don’t do anything Funky wouldn’t do… except smile, you can do that.

15 responses to “Bored on the 4th of July”

And the Atom shrank down to fix Batman’s brain in “Brave and Bold” #115. Definitely an oft-told tale.

By the way, an entire run of “Red Raven” would consist of a single issue, published in 1940. I doubt the book’s creators mourned its failure too much. A few months later, Joe Simon and Jack Kirby were back with a new book staring a new character who would make a much bigger impression — Captain America. (This fun Fourth of July factoid was brought to you by Red, White and Blue Beer)

So the guy works for a comic company, writes comics, and used to write Superman, and apparently he had no clue she knew anything about comics? And they’ve supposedly been dating for a while? Man, this is terrible writing.

Rip Tide Scuba Cop, being a fictional comic book hero in the Batiukverse, naturally fails to seal off that brain aneurysm. And then he gets demoted to desk duty for entering a blood stream outside of his jurisdiction and without a warrant.

Rip would be wracked by guilt and shame, consider suicide, then vanish for six years before returning with a light-hearted story arc about getting water in his ear.

I really enjoyed the Pete history too. I am always amazed by how he just totally ignores huge swaths of his own strip’s history as if it never even happened. The official FW page still features characters who haven’t appeared in years, which I find hilarious.

This “Hey!! Let’s forget the past if it gets in the way of my joke!!” garbage is why people don’t take him seriously. It’s going to take a sinister and stupid turn soon when he forgets how Americanized Rana is in order to make a stupid point about racism.

I don’t object to his writing for himself and a couple buddies. That’s fine, honestly. It can be great watching people amusing each other. It’s just this sort of fun is like watching people do this: “Hey, here’s an idea! So what does it remind you of?” “It was the two-page text story run in Super-Little-Dot meets Nightmare, Casper’s Scary Ghost Horse Friend number 14, published October of 1975!” “Excellent memory, my friend!”

OK, so, part of a nerdish fandom is showing off how you can remember stuff. I don’t don’t find that fun, not by itself. If you get the reference, you’re challenged with another. If you don’t get the reference, you’re mocked with how you could possibly have forgotten B’wana Beast meets Jerry Lewis. I prefer, if we are going on about remembering stuff, celebrating remembering stuff and maybe building on it by combining remembered stuff into some fresh observation.